


The Care and Keeping Of

by Inopportunist



Series: Father Frost [2]
Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Baby!Jack, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-04
Updated: 2013-04-04
Packaged: 2017-12-07 11:06:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/747823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inopportunist/pseuds/Inopportunist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>North, despite his love for them, has absolutely no clue how to care for children.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Care and Keeping Of

**Author's Note:**

> A continuation of North's Child.

North knows nothing about taking care of babies.

He supposes they eat and need changing and washing and coddling but the specifics escape him. The Yeti know only fractionally more than he, having their own children, but they are Yeti children. Jack is… Jack is something more like a human.

The infant is cold and pale and, according to Sandy’s explanation, can withstand conditions that would kill an adult human. Manny’s intervention is proof enough that Jack is different, that he is no mortal child. Sadly, knowing that Jack _isn’t_ human tells North nothing about his care and keeping.

Their first attempts at feeding the babe are… distressing.

A cloth soaked in some concoction the Yeti reserve for when no lactating females are present is put to the child’s mouth. Jack sucks happily at it, cooing and reaching up to North with tiny, chubby fingers before relaxing, belly full.

He begins shrieking not half an hour later, spitting up most of the milk substitute. North spends the next few hours trying to comfort the whining, sobbing infant whose forehead feels warm to the touch. Perhaps the nutrients needed by Yeti babies are too strong for spirit babies.

North then looks through his library, searching for anything that might help. There are tomes and scrolls detailing immortal children, but none so young and tiny as Jack. There are books on human society, but none which speak of how to care for infants. There are novels speaking of mothers nursing their children, but never what is given when there is no mother, as North is not partial to tragedy.

He calls for Tooth, who is a female and half human and might actually know something about human-like babies. She arrives swiftly, not having heard about the new addition to North’s Workshop, worried that something might be terribly wrong – there is, truly, something terribly wrong, but not near as wrong as she suspects.

“Have you tried actual milk?” she asks, cocking her head to the side as she stares at the tiny face. Blue eyes stare blearily back, glazed with fever still.

“Was afraid it might be too… what is word? Too heavy?” North replies, watching Jack squirm and frowning when the boy whimpers.

“Maybe he just doesn’t eat?” Tooth wonders.

North bites his lip. It _is_ entirely possible that an immortal child wouldn’t need food. But Jack is only an infant, certainly he should grow and didn’t children need sustenance to grow? He says as much and the Guardian of Memories shrugs, she’s never cared for a child like Jack before either.

They look briefly to Manny for guidance, but the moonbeams bring no message and they sit in frustration as Jack continues to whimper pitifully, tears falling from his big blue eyes. And North feels like a failure, he’s been blessed with this child and he cannot even feed Jack without harming him.

He feels desperation in his very core, urging him to do something, _anything_ , to find out what Jack needs. But he can only stare into the boy’s teary eyes, hoping that his upset belly with settle.

Phil stops by with a cool, wet rag for Jack’s warm forehead and North takes it absently. Tooth leaves to search the bookshelves herself, zipping around the Workshop and tossing books to the floor when she finds them useless. North watches her, following her with his eyes, hoping for inspiration to strike while running the cloth over Jack’s little face.

When he moves to pull the rag away, however, he finds it won’t budge. The Guardian of Wonder glances at the infant’s face, finding Jack sucking contentedly on the cool cloth, no longer whimpering and whining in pain. Worried, North gently pulls the fabric from the infant’s gummy grip only to find that the child seems much improved, until he begins to howl again.

“Cool water? That is what you are wanting, little one?”

North ponders the idea for a moment. Jack is cold as snow and cannot stomach warm milk substitute… Is cold water the answer? _Sandy found the infant on a frozen lake in the middle of winter._

“Phil!” He calls sharply. “Get me bowl of cold water!”

Bouncing the wailing infant in his arms, North wonders what spirit Jack is. Obviously something with cold and, according to his second name, frost. But he wonders what Jack is meant to _do_ , what his role is in the balance of the universe. And then Phil arrives with the bowl and the Guardian soaks the rag in frigid water before resting it against the babe’s mouth.

Jack suckles, just as he had with the concoction before, stopping when his belly is full and falling asleep in North’s arms. The coolness the boy emits is not unpleasant and the older finds himself cuddling the baby close, smiling broadly. And then Tooth flutters over to join them, having finally given up her search.

“How is he?” she whispers. North simply nods, not wanting to wake the infant. Tooth grins, little hand brushing back the shock of white hair with slender fingers so she can look into the contented little face. “I need to get back,” the Tooth Fairy admits lowly, “Call for me if you need anything.”

North nods again, standing as the Guardian of Memories zips out a window and into the cold morning air. They’ve been up all night, he realizes, looking down at his little boy once more. 

Suddenly he’s exhausted. He abandons the bowl and rag for his quarters, finding a Yeti-sized bassinet next to his bed. It’s much too large for Jack, but he settles the infant on the soft cushion anyway, preparing himself for sleep. But once his nightdress is on, he can’t help but sit at Jack’s bedside, watching a little chest rise and fall and tiny fingers curl, listening to light breathing speckled with coos and happy noises.

North falls asleep in his oversized chair, watching his son dream.

**Author's Note:**

> Jack needing only water to survive is something I've been tossing around in my head for a while. It came from the character design videos for RoTG, in which they mention that Jack is supposed to be more of a force of nature than a singular person. The idea, then, is that Jack needs to be well-hydrated to do his work with snow and ice. Perhaps the minerals in the water also play a part in his nutrition and maybe he might soak up moonlight for some of his energy, I'm not really sure. But the cold water would probably be soothing to Baby!Jack with his upset tummy.


End file.
